The Snow Leopard: Peter Matthiessen

Product Information

Although the story is light and entertaining yet when it is a story christened Snow Leopard Adventure just an off-hand mention of the animal might leave the reader asking for more. The author can be lauded for having an excellent story line and a gift for a superb dabbing in description. A massive old growth tree fell in Redwoods National Forest not a hundred feet from our tent, a victim of the worst drought in anyone's memory. The exposed roots were sadly dusty. Park workers told of the loss of many such trees. What the hell were we doing there, while the landscape and the people there were suffering?! What kind of self-indulgence had traveling become as the planet was dying before our very eyes? Was this just a naïve (and selfish) “vacation” on our part, to think we could just enjoy nature and somehow pretend for a time that we as a race were not in the process of contributing to this devastation? Maybe. Maybe we should have taken the trip money and contributed it to environmental organizations? Subchapter 16.1: The Trophy Hunting Program: Enhancing Snow Leopard Prey Populations Through Community Participation It was late fall, with winter a whisper away. Would they make it before the snow season turned the world impassable? Would they see the snow leopard? The element of suspense at the heart of this story exerts a mighty pull. But this is not a research thesis. There is a lyrical quality about his prose, particularly when he describes the natural environment or life in the remote, high altitude villages through which he travels. He describes the mountain people and their difficult life with a certain empathy that is often missing in the accounts of Western travelers of that era.

Down in the valley the soldiers came, in search of gold and slaves. They came with fire and fear, and the villagers fled. Now, I am no Buddhist. I’ve only dabbled with it through reading. The focus on figuring out how to stay calm when the world around you is collapsing or verging on total bedlam drew me in fully. We observe those attuned to Eastern philosophy and ways of thinking. I think the book has led me in the right direction. it is interesting to note that both Matthiessen and Schaller also had difficulty mastering the ability to attain an inner calm. Clearly a pervading sense of fatalism is closer to Eastern than Western thinking. Matthiessen’s book is part travelogue, part naturalist observations, and part coming to terms with loss. About a year after the death of his wife, Matthiessen travels along with a friend in search of a snow leopard, really in the search of big blue sheep. It’s much hiking and camping, and eating.The snow leopard is a rare animal of immense beauty. But so elusive is the snow leopard that it is often referred to as the ‘Grey Ghost of the Himalaya’. Joining a team of ecologists and explorers, Vikram and Aditya set off on an expedition to the Zanskar Mountains of Ladakh to search for the fabled leopard. The saga of Tsering, the young lama, continues in this story. Despite having being thwarted by Vikram and Aditya, his kidnappers are not about to give in. Camping under glaciers, tramping above the snowline, searching for blue sheep and the magnificent leopard ‘The Snow Leopard Adventure’ is a riveting story set amidst soaring mountains and deep valleys. I took this book to 17,000 feet for this picture. This is around the same altitude the author was when he wrote most of the book.

Here's some selections from the book to begin, so you can see Peter Matthiessen's spirit, his Buddhist nature, and his love of language, without my intervention or commentary:Matthiessen's endlessly droning voice reassures us that One Day we will all be completely happy....

Subchapter 16.3: Hunting of Prey Species: A Review of Lessons, Successes, and Pitfalls – Experiences from Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan But the point of this book is to neither romanticize nor demonize PM (or myself). I think we mostly do come to admire PM, at times, but that is decidedly not the point in his writing, overall. His goal is is to be honest, and clear. He is trying to empty his soul of all self-destructive desires and needs. But he has a son that needs him, you say, and you’d have a point. PM is not always an easy guy to get along with or like. He sometimes seems, regarding his hired sherpas, a tad ethnocentric, as even more so does his friend GS, if not downright racist on the rare occasion. But PM is not trying to whitewash his story. He is trying to be truthful about himself, and he is, about his marriage, for sure. I believe this is one reason some reviewers like the book less, that he is grumpy and cool and removed even by his own accounts, but this is one reason I admired his self reflection here. It feels honest; it feels real. The secret of the mountain is that the mountains simply exist, as I do myself: the mountains exist simply, which I do not. The mountains have no 'meaning,' they are meaning; the mountains are. The sun is round. I ring with life, and the mountains ring, and when I can hear it, there is a ringing that we share. I understand all this, not in my mind but in my heart, knowing how meaningless it is to try to capture what cannot be expressed, knowing that mere words will remain when I read it all again, another day.”

Success!

Don't worry, the snow leopard saves the village later by convincing the soldiers that the village is haunted by demons. The Himalayan exploration is interspersed with reflections of the author's tempestuous relationship with his deceased wife D. His wife’s recent death plays on his mind and casts a shadow. The snow leopard is also about his relationship with his wife and how that set him on this path of Zen and spiritual seeking. The spiritual bond that they shared was strong. They even experimented with hallucinogens. They accept Zen Buddhism as their calling. When she is ill and dying with cancer in a New York hospital the author places the Buddha figure he had acquired from a Tibetan refugee in Kathmandu’s Namche bazaar on the windowsill on the top of D’s bed. In her last hour, their Zen master Eido Roshi and the author holds her hands and chants their Buddhists vows. She passes away a little after midnight. The author leaves the hospital after daybreak. Snow is falling. It reminds of his wife’s fondness of the Zen expression about snowflakes. Deborah Love is an accomplished author herself and Mathiessen quoters her beautiful philosophy about this life should be lived-naturally like a flower unfolding. We need to grow ourselves until we understand the intelligence of the flower. Subchapter 16.2: Argali Sheep (Ovis ammon) and Siberian Ibex (Capra sibirica) Trophy Hunting in Mongolia